Abstract
This edited volume gathers together contributions supported by the European Science’s Foundation’s ‘Transnationalisation and Changing Inequality in Europe’ network. Arranged according to the principal topical foci of the project, the book elaborates on the situation concerning gender and gender relations, in terms of work and care in post-socialist Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries.
The challenge adopted by Roosalu and Hofäcker was to critically rethink family policies (including issues of parenthood and paid work), reimagining the potential for labour market participation and occupational and social mobility in ‘a New Europe’, by presenting comparisons of practices within both the CEE and Western European countries. Their aim of fundamentally rethinking gender roles in post-Socialist welfare states is achieved via two routes. First, there are chapters affording a comprehensive overview of family policies, fertility rates and female employment in the Old and New Europe. Second, they implement a multi-focal thematic approach to deepen understanding of the diversity inherent in structural and cultural changes, thereby expanding existing geographic and social boundaries.
Focusing on the Viségrad countries, Estonia, Bulgaria and Romania, as well as on Germany, France, Norway and Italy, the book permits two observations that might appear obvious, but which are not sufficiently emphasised. First, there are several ways in which Western European countries are not significantly different from those in CEE; for example, it remains difficult to identify a clear policy of labour market for women in either, despite their apparently different labour market regimes and reforms. Second, the CEE countries are internally diverse and unique, rendering reliance on traditional stereotypes underpinned by the notion of the presence of a distinct geographical group problematic. To exemplify this it is noted that familial childcare is financially supported in Hungary, the Czech Republic and Estonia, but not in Poland and Slovakia.
Abandoning the view that childcare is a female task, this book examines issues of equal rights for parenthood in depth, by evaluating the situation in the CEE and Western European countries. The edited volume highlights the double burden of Bulgarian and Hungarian women, who still have to work in the household while also working outside of it, but also shows that being a single parent, regardless of gender, serves as a discriminatory factor in the Czech labour market.
Roosalu and Hofäcker propose three new avenues for future research. First, that it is important to analyse the transmission of gender and labour market roles from mothers to daughters specifically, and the views held by male and female millennials generally, as they are the first generation to grow up entirely in the post-socialist era. For example, the Polish case shows no polarisation between fertility and employment roles, reflecting the socialist cultural heritage, in which all labour market participation was appreciated. However, the processes of communicating the continuity and change that informs these roles require further research. Second, there is a need to focus more on the different, and potentially growing number of parental groups that do not adhere to the model of the heterosexual couple. This might create a need for new childcare policies informed by research on parental leave and the ‘new’ labour market. Third, as supported by the Estonian case, it is important to consider not only the decision to abandon (whether temporarily or permanently) the labour market after the birth of a child, but also the degree of satisfaction arising from this choice. Furthermore, it is important to distinguish between, for example, whether women left the labour market under pressure, or if they did so because their priorities had changed.
This edited volume does not provide sufficient data to decisively conclude whether the picture painted of CEE women as losers, in terms of jobs and rights, and care and career, is too pessimistic or too generic. It is clear, however, that the provision of opportunities for women to freely make choices and pursue change in CEE countries and Western Europe lies at the centre of this ongoing debate.